Ellinwood

I had that link but the one I bookmarked is broken now I'm sure a quick search on PSU or Google would yield the correct page.

Out of the 9 people who graduated with me with a B.S. in Atmos. Sci., two of us have full-time jobs and one has a part-time job, all as forecasters. Two of the atmos. people that went the B.A. route (out of about 6-8) have broadcast met jobs. The rest of the B.S. graduates are all in graduate school or just finished. And this was the group that graduated in one of the worst times to get into the real world in recent history. I'm sure it's different at other schools, but that's what happened at SUNY Albany. I did start looking in March, so it took about 10 months in total. Virtually no one was hiring entry level from March-June. I took a job-hunt hiatus for the most part in August-September, but then the job market started to open back up in October so I went for it and got in. I stopped applying to the NWS in June... I'd like to think I saved myself a bit of time trying (EDIT: Though it is suggested that you DO keep trying!) If you really want to look into what kinds of private sector jobs are being offered, http://www.nwas.org/jobs.php is a really good place to start. (EDIT: It looks like that will be going to a paid service in January, so get your looking in now!) Another good site is the AMS jobs page: http://careercenter.ametsoc.org/c/search_results.cfm

FWIW to those who are looking... I got a full-time entry level position last in Feb. 2010. I graduated with a B.S. in Atmospheric Science and minors in Math and Comp. Sci. in May 2009, and I spent one semester of graduate school in Fall 2009. I had the summer internship with the NWS, a summer research job in meteorology amongst a few other things. Having good communication skills is also very important in this industry. Before I got this job, I had had interviews with 4 other companies and could have had one with a 6th interview with another company, and all of those took place between October and January. Get good grades, diversify yourself, and get as much experience as you can.

This, but more grammatically correct I lol'd at the "forced into the private sector" part, like it was some sort of despicable evil. Nearly all mets. work odd hours even into middle-aged or older years unless they land a top job or go into management. I happen to love my 2:30am-11:30am schedule because I get the afternoon off to do shopping when everyone's at work or I can go storm chasing I'd like to get some data on the 21-25k salary range with poor raises, as I am rather skeptic about those figures. Maybe in certain companies... The second to last paragraph about how everything's getting automated and that you need less forecasters to do the job is complete bull. I'd like to hear what qualifies you to make all of the statements in your original post. While it is still difficult to get a met job for those starting out, you'll have to make some sacrifices like living somewhere that you didn't want to or starting out in a part-time position, but if you really do like the weather and forecasting then stick with it.